Whoa. Apparently being a victim of domestic violence is a pre-existing condition to health insurance companies.
http://www.seiu.org/2009/09/domestic-violence-victims-have-a-pre-existing-condition.php
Wow. Obama and the dems have no idea how strong the backlash from the left is going to be if the pass a health care bill that forces us to buy coverage from these companies under threat of being fined.
Oh yeah, this happens all the time. The other day at work I ran across some paperwork that indicated that they were considering denying someone insurance because they had a past history of heavy periods. Heavy periods is a pre-existing condition!
You know what really pisses me off? They act like ANYTHING that’s a preexisting condition translates into someone who’s like the stereotypical profoundly MR VERY medically fragile type.
I have a genetic disorder. While the manifesations of it translate into me being pretty medically complex, overall I am INCREDIBLY healthy to the point where one time when I had to go to the ER due to a medication reaction post surgery, I ran into my pediatrican (this was when I was a teen) and at first I didn’t know who he was.
Well, my understanding is that as proposed, companies will no longer be allowed to deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions…
but Domestic Violence? WTF??? Of all the pre-existing conditions, that is at least completely CURABLE.
While I wouln’t put anything past insurance companies, read the article link
That link is quoting 15 year old surveys. Does anyone know of a more updated source? Are they still able to deny insurance, and more importantly has anyone been denied insurance because of it?
We have lots of laws on the books that are never enforced, and just because you can do something, doesn’t mean insurance companies DO do it.
I’m not saying they are not denying it, it’s just I can’t find anything but blogs and social sites.
The closest I found was
of course that again is old and it goes on and one cannot determain if the health insurance was cancelled for too many claims, such as auto insurers will cancel you if you claim too much. And it doesn’t make a difference between denial and cancellation, which could be a huge deal.
It also doesn’t say how many claims were reinstated upon appeal.
As I said, I’m not saying this statement isn’t true, necessarily but it’s too vaguely worded to be take face value
CT has a law protecting it’s citizens from the insurance companies “pre-existing condition” BS. Your post made me curious so I goog’d and found this about CT. http://www.cga.ct.gov/2009/rpt/2009-R-0317.htm
There was just very recently a podcast I had which pointed out that genetic screening may well ruin the medical insurance industry, because even if the companies don’t know your information, for a little money you can. If you’re not predisposed, you tend not to pay much for medical coverage, meaning that the companies will be insuring only the people most likely to have large expenses, driving the coverage costs out of reach of most people, crashing the system.
I would need more information, but that policy as written doesn’t necessarily exclude companies from denying a policy based on a pre-existing condition. It only allows them to exclude coverage for pre-existing conditions for a maximum of 12 months after a policy is written.
For example, Company A says 'You have asthma so we won’t write you a policy." That statement from CT doesn’t bar that.
Company B says “You have asthma but we’ll write you a policy anyway. However we won’t cover any treatment for asthma for 18 months.” The CT guidelines would bar that because it goes beyond the 12 month rule.
The only example I saw in the linked report from that article was this,
“After remarrying, she applied for health insurance and was told that should would not be covered for treatment relating to the abuse-related pre-existing conditions of depression and neck injury.”
The cause of the injury and history of depression aren’t really as relevant as the fact that she was applying for coverage with existing problems.
In 2006, Democrats tried to end the practice, but it died in committee when the vote to put it forward ended in a tie (10-10) Cite.
Anyone surprised?
I had a 12 month policy hold out when I started working for my employer. I had a couple pre existing conditions, so I had to pay out of pocket for that treatment for a year… really sucked. But now it’s getting covered!
Doesn’t look like a whole lotta protection there: per that table, they can exclude coverage for the condition itself, for 12 months.
So if you’ve got something expensive. you’re still stuck for 6 months to 2 years (depending on the type of policy). This isn’t anything revolutionary - when I started a new job 20ish years ago, there was the same deal. That table also doesn’t say they have to let you buy a policy, just that if they do, they have to cover the condition after a while.
Nor does it prevent them from charging someone a huge hefty surcharge for having the condition (well, a group policy might not, so much, but an individual one could).
(on preview, Antinor01 said pretty much the same).
Hmmm I don’t understand. I’ve changed jobs twice since being diagnosed with MS and didn’t have any trouble getting covered. Is it because I had no break in coverage? Did I get lucky moving to a job with great insurance? They seem pretty standard to me. Treating MS is pretty darn expensive too.
In addition to domestic violence, pregnancy is also often considered a pre-existing condition. Insurance companies have long been discriminatory towards women.
It’s the “no break in coverage” that protects you. HIPAA requires this for companies that meet certain criteria (size, not-self-insured, etc.): Portability of Health Coverage | U.S. Department of Labor
http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq_consumer_hipaa.html
HIPAA was passed in 1996, Before that, a change in jobs could mean loss of coverage for pre-existing conditions.
Supposedly, pregnancy can no longer be excluded:
http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq_consumer_hipaa.html (search for pregnancy).
Though a colleague of mine, 10 or so years ago, was forced to enroll in the most expensive coverage available (she’d been covered at her husband’s job; when he lost his job she had to enroll with our employer; though HIPAA forced the insurers to cover her, there was something funny with our contract).
Go CT!
I moved to CA early in my second pregnancy. My first one was very high risk, so I didn’t want to wait to seek medical before I moved, but my new ins in CA would see this as a pre-existing condition, if I had visited a ob/gyn and documented the pregnancy.
I did go to my doctor and when I moved I argued that the insurance would just be paying to medically treat a sick baby if they didn’t want to treat me while pregnant. The finally relented, but talk about horrible policies!
ETA: This was 12 years ago.
Did you change insurance companies? If you stick with the same insurance company, it’s not necessarily a new policy.
A lot also depends on the type of insurance. The original models for health insurance were nonprofits like Blue Cross/Blue Shield.* In the late 70s, profit making businesses became common. That was an obviously bad idea: the easiest way to increase profits is to deny claims. And that’s what we’re seeing.
The preexisting conditions issue is bad enough, but there’s also rescission. This is when insurance companies cancel policies over trivial errors on the original application. This leads to cases where a person was denied insurance to treat cancer because she neglected to mention that, years before, she had been treated for acne. Insurance companies rate their workers about how much money they save from this. The law should require that rescission is only allowed where the customer has fraudulently claimed he didn’t have the condition that he is now asking treatment for.
*They were originally two different organization. Blue Cross paid for hospital stays (and was founded not to help patients, but to provide a steady income stream to hospitals). Blue Shield paid for doctor’s visits. Eventually, they
It is and should be. Insurance, of any kind, is not intended to cover already planned expenses. Pregnancy is a self correcting pre existing condition though and stops being an issue after birth or termination. It has nothing to do with discrimination.